


Under Fire

by dustlines



Series: Post-8x23 ("Sacrifice") [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Coda, Falling Angels (Supernatural), Post-Episode: s08e23 Sacrifice, Season/Series 08
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-15
Updated: 2013-05-15
Packaged: 2020-07-23 15:40:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20010718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dustlines/pseuds/dustlines
Summary: The leaves are wet, fragrant like rot, getting into Castiel’s hair. They cling to his clothes when he scrambles up from the ground, spinning around without any sense of direction. The sky above him is a lit fuse, milky blues turned red and gold, the scent of burning wings in every deep inhale.He’s done this. He’s brought this upon the world. Heaven is falling, and it’s all on him.





	Under Fire

**Author's Note:**

> Though each can be viewed wholly independently, this can be seen as a prequel to my other post-8x23 fic, [Raining Men](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20010919).

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The leaves are wet, fragrant like rot, getting into Castiel’s hair. They cling to his clothes when he scrambles up from the ground, spinning around without any sense of direction. The sky above him is a lit fuse, milky blues turned red and gold, the scent of burning wings in every deep inhale.  
  
He’s done this. He’s brought this upon the world. Heaven is falling, and it’s all on him.  
  
Sweat bleeds through Castiel’s clothes, a wet heat down his back as he shoves off from the slippery ground and starts to run. The terror in him is almost a living thing, sharing the void in his chest where there is _something_ growing into the space where his Grace used to rest.  
  
Blinding flashes of dying angels light up the trees as he bursts through brambles and bends over backwards in an empty field, neck aching as he looks up, nearly overbalancing, nearly colliding with the dirt. He wonders how many of his family will survive. He wonders if _any_ will survive.  
  
He can feel his eyes burning as he grabs his hair, and a sound is escaping him like he’s never heard before, high and long, barely audible, a whimper like only animals and people who are in tremendous pain make. The light in the sky is blinding, leaving afterimages on his retinas, but he can’t look away. He can’t—  
  
Suddenly, Dean’s voice, screaming his name; screaming it again, more complete: “ _Cas!_ ” and then “ _Castiel!_ ” As if thinking that if one name won’t summon him home, maybe the other one will.  
  
It doesn’t matter what Dean calls him now. Cas is already redirecting, his chest feeling like it’s bursting with heat. Something in him is flickering and warm, though not fully developed, the trembling warmth fading from his senses as it sinks into his muscles, his bones, his fingers, becoming indecipherable from the rest of him. A _soul?_ He doesn’t know how that’s possible, if it even _is_.  
  
He realizes there are tears pouring from him, endless. How could he ever explain this? How could he even try?  
  
The Impala is at the end of a long, slick road, and Castiel, barreling through the last group of trees and into the emptier, hollow air beyond them, runs towards the car with everything he has. The ground is shaking now, as angels land one after the other. Sometimes, Castiel hears them screaming.  
  
“Dean!” Castiel shouts, down the road, needing to be heard. Several angels are crashing down near the Winchesters, throwing up debris in the form of fire and rock. The Winchesters are jumping into the car, Dean hurling Sam into the back seat before ripping open the front door and throwing himself in behind the wheel. Cas shouts Dean’s name, again, his arms waving in front of him, but his voice is drowned out by the sudden roar of the Impala’s engine.  
  
The ground jolts below and Cas cries out, thrown to his elbows, chin scraping the ground. The Impala rushes towards him, lightning fast, getting bigger in almost no time at all, and Cas has flashbacks to just a few nights before, lying on the road and wondering if he was about to be split in half.  
  
The Impala screeches to a swinging halt, the front door kicking open. Inside, Dean is bathed in the reflected fire of the angels falling from the sky. He thrusts out a hand.  
  
“Get in!” he shouts, and Cas doesn’t hesitate to grab the hand held out to him.  
  
Dean _yanks_ Cas so hard into the car that he thinks his shoulder possibly dislocates, and as Dean guns the accelerator again, rocketing down the road, Cas is thrown by the sudden force against Dean’s chest. He scrambles further until he is past Dean’s lap, dragging himself into the passenger seat and folding to gape through the windows as angels blaze to death in the sky.  
  
“Cas, you okay?” Sam shouts from the backseat, even though he himself looks sick enough to vomit. He’s staring out the back window, eyes wide and skin a little too gray as the car, her engine roaring, hurtles them all down the slippery road.  
  
“No,” Cas says, truthfully. It doesn’t bare talking about, so he whirls to Dean. “We need to get under something.” Cas’ voice is shaking hard, cracking like he feels like his body is going to. “There’s… a bridge. Stone. It’s—” His mind blanks as he tries to find the landmark with senses that no longer stretch that far.  
  
“Yeah, I know where— _motherfu-!_ ” Dean yanks the wheel to the left, nearly toppling the car as the fireball of an angel explodes mere inches from where the Impala had just been, throwing up dirt and a blast of heat against Cas’ window. Jaw firm, Dean just keeps the car moving forward, but Cas’ heart starts pounding so hard he can’t breathe.  
  
“No,” Castiel gasps, clutching at the dashboard with numbing hands. “ _No_.” His entire body is nothing but shakes now, and suddenly Dean’s hand is gripping his shoulder, drawing him back.  
  
“Keep it together! Bridge is ahead!”  
  
The flashes are still blinding in the car, darkness followed by daylight in rapid succession. Cas ducks his head between his knees so he doesn’t have to see it, holding on to the door handle with one hand and — he realizes a bit later — the side of Dean’s leg with the other. For now, Cas stares only at the carpet below his feet, where bits of grass and mud stain the place where boots settle in during long drives home.  
  
“CAS!” Dean shouts, and then Sam’s hand is landing on Cas’ spine, holding him over the back seat.  
  
“I’ll be all right,” Cas rasps, though there is a rushing in his head and he can hear a shrilling, high-pitched ringing in his ears that has nothing to do with Heaven.  
  
“You better be!” With a slap against Cas’ spine, Dean returns both hands to the wheel.  
  
Outside, one half of Castiel’s family hurtles down from the sky in spectacular arcs, more losses here than Heaven has ever seen before. The ones that live will be forever changed. Cas knows that he, himself, is already something different than he was before.  
  
Perhaps he’ll figure out what he thinks about that later. For now, it’s all he can do to hold onto smooth plastic with his right hand and warm denim with his left, trying to keep breathing despite the caustic ash on his tongue and in the burning sky.

.

  
2013.05.15

[.](https://dustlines.livejournal.com/21989.html)

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